Knights
by Shar-dono
Summary: Dark fic challenge based on the song


Knights  
(Based on "The Queen and the Soldier")  
  
by: Shar-dono  
  
**Disclaimer** I don't claim rights to the song nor the series GW.  
  
She caught her fingers picking away at the lace edges of her gown   
and folded them neatly in her lap. The woman in the mirror was the   
perfect picture of a princess, rod-straight, statue-still, chin high,   
regal in white satin-and-lace. The picture of a Queen of the Earth.   
There she sat for long moments, contemplating herself, studying eery   
minute detail of her reflection as a tutor would his protege before his   
recital; an artist his masterpiece.  
And indeed, that was what they were. This woman in the mirror, the   
Queen whose spun-gold crown was rooted to her very scalp to the end of   
her days, this perfect, strong, sensitive woman-child. She was the   
ultimate masterpiece. The ship's proud figurehead that inspires her   
crew aboard across unknown seas to the end of their days, persuing her,   
the Queen of the prow.  
And this woman who now caught the erring hand and placed it in its   
place, this was the sculptor. The sharp feminity that ran deeper than   
its years, that was intelligent enough to spur ceaselessly with rows   
upon rows of tiresome old men, and yet, wise enough to withold the   
truth of its potentials. Inside the perfect sculpture, was the perfect   
mind who by will alone could bring the world to its knees.  
There was a rap on the door.  
  
"Come in."  
A man appeared in her mirror. Nothing escapes its merciless   
reflection in this room. He was ill-suited to the grandeur of the room,   
yet refreshed it. The thick locks of brown hair did well in accenting   
his gaze: sharp, ambitious, eyes of the wild.  
"I want to talk to you." The hesitation was almost indistinct; but   
she heard, for she was a prowling creature, too. A hunter. Like him.  
He stood behind her, a stiff military attention pulling his   
shoulders back and his feet together as second nature. The perfect   
soldier was Heero Yuy. Always have, always will be. Just as she was the   
perfect Mother-Statue, whose only sign of aknowledgement was a pair of   
discreetly lowered eyes.  
She studied him in the mirror.  
  
"I'm going back to space."  
"When will you be back?"  
"I'm not. I'm not coming back." Neither composures broke. Silence   
fell gently, like the first snow that melts unseen into the earth.  
"You're leaving me, then."  
"Yes."  
He was watching her in the mirror, watching for the lightest flutter   
of lashes that would tell him his words struck home. She was such easy   
prey, motionless in her chair. His gun snuggled assuringly in its   
holsteragainst his side. It was so easy. All he had to do was draw and   
shoot. He could be out of the system before they even realise she was   
dead. In his mind he replayed it over and over, a thousand cold,   
meticulous times. But when it got down to the real thing, he just had   
know why.  
  
"What are you, Relena? Here in your room on the top of the world.   
Who are you."  
"Heero?" The tilt of her head brought him closer and he was   
strangely relieved, as if he had been secretly fearing she was nothing   
more than cold marble and a voice.  
She was never so young, so vulnerable, than when she was dressed as   
such in this room, this woman that he fought to protect. He had died   
for her a dozen times-- and he will do it again, a hundred, a million   
times over, and still it would not be enough.  
"Why?" His predator's instincts knew the manipulations at work and   
they both knew the question.  
There was a war in space. There will always be wars in space. But   
she had the power, the influence and resources. She could stop it.   
Instead, it had been permitted to last. Why had she not made her move?  
The clear blue eyes that met his with such cold authority were   
lofty, not the ones he knew and fought for.  
"You won't understand."  
A fleeting pain passed her eyes as a thread of fire and her face   
quickly shut up again, to turn away.  
His arms folded instinctively around her, thinking how hard it must   
be for the fearless dove to be shut up in a gilded cage when her place   
was out there, soaring free of the painful tedium that made up the   
steps of this social ball. He understood her spirit. It was the spirit   
that forced its way around his. It was the glow that captured his eye,   
there among the infinate stars of the Universe. For a moment, he was   
chagrined; but his mind was set on leaving.  
"Come with me." He said simply, flat as he always had, sincere as he   
could never help to be but, when with her.  
  
"Why?" He fixed his eyes on her. In those eyes, she had found reason   
for hope and dream. In those eyes, she had seen the Universe, the burst   
of the sun against the not-quite blackness of space, the ringed and   
layered glow of the planets and far away stars that she could only hear   
about but never see. She wanted those eyes to always be on her, such   
that she may see that miraculous sky; she wanted to be those eyes.   
Always have.  
"You won't understand."  
Yes, he can never understand. Not the gundam pilot who finds his   
eyes in the stars, never realising she found the stars in his eyes. Not   
him.  
And he was leaving.  
He slipped his arm around her, holding her to him. She let her   
forehead press against his torso, studying the crimson carpet. Crimson,   
such that no blood spilt will stain and show. The handgun rested cool   
against her tigh beneath the pure white dress. It wouldn't take much to   
reach for it and shoot him. There was a secret slit in her skirt   
especially for this. One that not even he knows. She was hidden from   
view by her volumous dress and he will never know until she replaced   
her brow with the nozzle and pulled the trigger. The dress will stain,   
but she will never wear this dress again. It wasn't proper for the   
Queen of the Earth to be seen in the same dress twice.  
He began unravelling the elaborate coil and smoothing down her hair   
as one would putting a small child to sleep. "Come with me."  
But that could not be done, either.  
She will never get as close, go as far, never see as he could and   
know of these things. Her prescence in her garden will surely wither it   
when the man who brought her these treasures takes her to them and   
sought to go among them no more. Her garden bloomed only for him.  
She pushed away from him.  
  
"You are trapped here, but don't want to leave. I don't understand   
you, Relena."  
Her eyes were upon the mirror, refusing to meet his. "There is too   
much to do here, Heero. I can't... not yet."  
He nodded curtly. "I understand."  
He understood everything; and nothing.  
"Take care, Relena."  
"You too, Heero."  
She watched him leave through the mirror, thinking how he needn't...   
shouldn't have come. He always did, although she was the one who   
assigns him his missions. She always asked him to come back soon. Not   
this time. This time he will not come back. Cannot come back.  
She rose finally from her chair and approached the small side-table   
under the window. Her thoughts wandered amongst the grey skies for a   
moment as her quill poised over the vellum. Then, she began a short   
note and ended by sealing it in tiny tube that attached on the leg of a   
pigeon that had landed on her sill.  
That galaxy in his eyes were hers and hers alone. If she was to lose   
it, then the world must lose it too. Just as she had ways of ensuring   
his continued existance, she knew ways to end it.  
Relena Peacecraft rearranged her skirts back in her chair and   
leisurely restored her hair to its tight topcoil. Yes, she could have   
stopped this new war before it even began. She had already seen it   
coming. But whatever reasons with which she sent them up, the war was   
neccessary to bring her shining knights back to her.  
Now, Heero was gone.  
  
But there will still be Milliardo.  
  
~~ The End ~~ 


End file.
